


Vanilla

by lucretia_the_director



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Balance Campaign, Enthusiastic Consent, F/M, Knotting, Praise Kink, The Stolen Century
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-04
Updated: 2017-07-04
Packaged: 2018-11-23 04:37:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11395476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucretia_the_director/pseuds/lucretia_the_director
Summary: Magnus knew the signs of Lucretia's heat better than she ever did. When her eyes would go soft and she would stare off into the distance, he would tease her and bring her back home. When her nails left their mark on her hands, he would pry open her fists and kiss her palms. When she started to pace and the scent of vanilla overtook everything else, he would pick her up, pin her up against the nearest surface and kiss her until she begged for more.Magnus knew Lucretia better than anyone ever did. And when he forgot her, Lucretia had a hard time remembering how to live without him.





	Vanilla

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ElZacharie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElZacharie/gifts).



By the fifth cycle, Magnus could tell you, to the minute, when Lucretia's heat started. 

It had nothing to do with timing and everything to do with the woman herself. Her eyes would go soft as she stared into the distance and her hands would tense, nails digging crescents into her palms. She wouldn't be able to sit still, constantly shifting in her seat or pacing, seemingly without noticing. And her scent, sunshine and warmth, crisp paper and ink, would turn sweet, vanilla creeping in and overtaking everything else. 

Oftentimes, he suspected, he noticed before she did. 

_

Her eleventh heat hit her hard, desperation taking over almost before Magnus noticed the signs. She'd locked herself in her room within twenty-four hours and she refused to open the door, not even to Lup when she tried to bring her food and water. 

Concern and confusion swept through the Starblaster as one day turned into two, and two into three. The sweet vanilla of Lucretia's heat was drowned out by the stench of desperation, strong enough that even the non-human members of the crew could smell it. 

Magnus found himself outside her room without conscious thought, naturally drawn in by the desperation and distress emanating in near visible waves from Lucretia's quarters. Knocking quietly, he was unsurprised when he received no verbal answer, only a long, drawn out groan of frustration and need. 

"Lucretia? Luc? I know you're having trouble and I just wanted to let you know that my door is always open if you decide you want help. It doesn't have to mean anything if you don't want; just a friend helping a friend." He paused, but there was no answer. "You don't have to answer now, just let me know you heard me."

"Go away, Magnus," she replied, weakly, voice barely making it through the thick door. 

"I will. I just want you to know I'm here if you need me." He left and went to his room, very deliberately not latching his door.

_

It was dark, the automatic lights of the ship having long since dimmed, when Magnus woke to a body slipping into bed beside him. Lucretia was fever hot and shaking when she lay beside him, bare arm pressed almost innocently along the length of his. 

"Is that offer still on the table?" she asked, breathlessly, leaning into the contact.

Magnus rolled, pinning her to the bed lightly in response. She melted into the bed when his bare chest pressed against her, their bodies separated only by the thin, sweat-soaked pajamas she still wore. "What do you need?" His breath fanned over her face and she sighed, closing her eyes. 

"Just this, for now. I don't know what's wrong. I've been taking care of myself for years; I've never had this burning need for...human contact." Her voice was so low, little more than air shaping words, and Magnus had to lean closer, pressing his forehead against hers just to hear her. "It's like there's something under my skin that wants more than I can give."

He slid his hands up her arms, over her shoulders, and into her hair, leaving a trail of goose bumps on her skin. Twining his fingers in her curls, he held her for a long moment, letting her tense muscles relax and her violent shaking fade into an occasional tremble. 

"Kiss me?" He did, gently, lips barely brushing hers. For a moment, that was all there was, until Lucretia's mouth fell open on a sigh and he deepened the kiss, all teeth and tongues. 

Then she bit his lip, hard, and the world spun, and all of the sudden, he was looking up at Lucretia as she sat across his hips, a vision with wild hair and a tentative smile in the low light. "You said this didn't have to mean anything." Magnus nodded, unable to speak. "What if I wanted it to mean something? Could we do that, instead?"

Magnus slid his hands up her sides under her shirt, calloused fingers against delicate skin making her shiver. He paused only a moment to cup her breasts, weighing them in his hands and thumbing her nipples, before pulling her shirt the rest of the way up and off. "Anything you want, Luc. I've wanted you for so long. Gods, you are so beautiful."

She flushed and looked away, opening her mouth as though to argue. Magnus beat her to it, capturing her open mouth with his before she could say a word. "Absolutely, insanely, perfectly, stunningly beautiful."

She giggled, nervously, still refusing to meet his eyes as she leaned down to kiss him again. She ground down against him as they kissed, and the sight, smell, taste, sound of her was already enough to have him teetering on the edge. 

He lifted her off of him, strong arms shifting her effortlessly into the air as she yelped into his mouth, breaking the kiss to look down at him in confusion. "This is about you, remember? Not me."

"I don't mind-"

"Nope," he interrupted. "All about you." He rolled them again, putting her back against the bed again. 

"Are you ready to lose these yet?" he asked playfully, tugging at the elastic waistband of her sleep shorts. She nodded and moved her hands to shove them down herself, only to laugh delightedly when Magnus whipped them down her legs and off, without ceremony, and threw them to the floor.

"Spread those pretty legs for me, sweetheart," he murmured and Lucretia obeyed, instantly and thoughtlessly. She looked away in embarrassment as Magnus settled between her thighs, looking back only when he pressed a kiss against her stomach. "Such a good girl," he whispered, almost absentmindedly. 

Lucretia made a desperate, high-pitched noise in the back of her throat, and Magnus looked up just in time to see her clap her hands over her mouth in mortification. "You like that, do you? Being my good girl?" He beamed up at her and she nodded helplessly in agreement. 

"Well, guess what?" He reached up and pulled her hands away from her mouth. "I like you being my good girl, too." Her face was radiating the heat of her embarrassment and she refused to meet his eyes. "Come on, Luc, look at me," he whispered, staring up at her with his chin resting on her stomach. 

When she finally looked down, he praised her again, almost teasingly this time, and she shoved at his shoulder in protest. "Stop calling me that!" she hissed.

"Why?"

"Because I'm not-!"

"Yes, you are! You are so good. So good for me, so good at your job, so good at everything. You're not gonna change my mind, Luc, so just let me say it!"

She huffed in frustration but didn't protest any more, instead pushing at his head and muttering embarrassedly for him to get on with it. 

He did, happily, sliding down her body and letting the roughness of his sideburns rub against the delicate skin of her inner thighs. She moaned happily as his mouth settled against her clit, resolutely ignoring the praise he whispered into her skin. His calloused fingers slid over her again, down and into the sopping wetness between her legs. She convulsed at the feeling of those rough fingers sliding into her, thighs clamping tightly around his head and her body curling up towards him, involuntarily. 

"Fuck me!" she gasped. "Magnus, please, just fuck me!"

He laughed, but there was no malice in the sound, no mockery of her desperation, only pure, unadulterated joy. She couldn't help but laugh along, happiness fairly bursting out of her. 

Magnus scrambled out of his boxers, their laughter still echoing through the room as he fought the uncooperative fabric. He collapsed back on top of her, playfully, but still with enough force to knock the breath out of her lungs. He apologized, absentmindedly, distracted as she wrapped her legs around his naked hips. 

"Wait," she said, suddenly, and Magnus groaned. "You have a condom, right?"

Groaning again, he stretched towards the bedside table, barely managing to get the drawer open from his position. Fumbling blindly, he spent a long moment making no progress before Lucretia huffed in frustration. "You're ruining the mood, Magnus."

He pushed at her legs where they rested at his hips. "Let me go for a second, Luc."

She did and he rolled off the bed, emerging triumphantly with the elusive condom and rolling it on. Lucretia pounced as he finished, surprising him enough to knock him back onto the bed. "Enough screwing around," she announced, throwing her leg across him and settling into place. "If I have to wait any longer, I think I might actually die."

Grabbing her hips, he jerked her down roughly, impaling her on his cock, laughing when she shouted and her eyes widened in surprise. "That's what you wanted, right?"

Bracing her hands on his chest and relaxing until she could take the rest of him, she sighed, blissfully. "Absolutely."

Shifting, both until she was comfortable and until Magnus' teeth threatened to go through his lip, she lifted up slowly before dropping back down. Magnus, feeling her muscles already starting to tremble, slid his hands under her thighs and helped support her as she moved. 

Faster and faster, they lost themselves in the rhythm, until the pressure of Magnus' knot became great enough that it snapped him out of his trance. Slowing Lucretia's hips, he ignored her whine of protest, waiting until she was lucid enough to open her eyes and look at him questioningly. "My knot," he said, breathlessly. "I can pull out before-"

"Magnus Burnsides, I swear to Pan that if you don't knot me properly, right now, I am going to leave and I will never, ever come back," she swore, frustrated tears threatening to fall as she struggled against his restraining hands. 

Letting her fall back down onto him, he watched, mesmerized, as she bounced a few more times before grinding down onto his growing knot, trapping it inside her. Her eyes rolled back into her head as his knot expanded to it's full width and he came convulsively, clutching at whatever part of Lucretia he could reach. 

He collapsed back, panting, and took a moment to compose himself. Opening his eyes, he was greeted with the sight of Lucretia rubbing furiously at her own clit, trying to tip herself over the edge. More tears gathered in her eyes as the same desperation that wouldn't allow her to get herself off earlier prevented her from coming now.

Brushing her hands aside, gently, he took over, watching as she collapsed in relief as he was able to manipulate her into the orgasm she'd been chasing for days. 

Lucretia lay limply against Magnus' chest as he moved, trying to find a comfortable position for them to rest in as they drifted off to sleep.

_

Magnus knew the signs of Lucretia's heat better than she ever did. When her eyes would go soft and she would stare off into the distance, he would tease her and bring her back home. When her nails left their mark on her hands, he would pry open her fists and kiss her palms. When she started to pace and the scent of vanilla overtook everything else, he would pick her up, pin her up against the nearest surface and kiss her until she begged for more. 

Magnus knew Lucretia better than anyone ever did. And when he forgot her, Lucretia had a hard time remembering how to live without him.

_

"Do you smell that?" 

"Smell what?"

Taako and Magnus were, for lack of a better term, skulking through the halls of the Bureau of Balance, looking for trouble. "I swear I smell... vanilla?"

Magnus wandered off, following the smell without waiting for a response from Taako. His nose lead him to the Director's office, where he found her pacing back and forth across the small space.

"Director? Lucretia, are you all right?" He intercepted her as she made another pass of the room, catching her hands in his and smoothing the tension out of her fists. Absently, he raised her hands to his mouth and kissed her palms. 

"What - what are you doing, Magnus?"

"I don't know," he admits, sheepishly. "I just felt like that was what I was supposed to do just then."

Lucretia swallows hard, the lump in her throat threatening to choke her.

**Author's Note:**

> [ Tumblr!](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/lucretia-the-director)


End file.
